Automotive companies and their suppliers are working hard to rapidly develop and implement vehicle situational awareness systems designed to technologically assist a driver in discerning and effectively reacting to objects in the environment around a vehicle. Examples of such systems include forward collision warning systems, backup parking aids and driver vision enhancement.
Driver vision enhancement systems, in particular, are intended to assist a driver operating a vehicle in conditions of less than optimal visibility, such as darkness, heavy rain or fog. These systems generally operate by monitoring the area immediately surrounding the vehicle and providing the driver with advanced notice of any object which is sensed by the system and determined to have the potential for intersecting the path in which the vehicle is traveling. This advanced notice is intended to compensate for a driver's reduced ability to visually make the same determination, thereby providing the driver with additional time to react to a potential obstacle.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,963,148, for example, discloses a system which utilizes a video camera in combination with a temperature sensor (in the form of an infrared camera) to identify objects in or on the road ahead of the vehicle, such as a pedestrian, animal or even ice. The driver is warned of the presence of a sensed object or condition by an audible alarm or by a visual display inside the vehicle. Saneyoshi (U.S. Pat. No. 5,410,346) similarly utilizes stereo cameras to detect objects in the roadway ahead of the vehicle and provide an advanced warning signal to the driver.
While such systems may prove effective in sensing and alerting the driver to a potential obstacle or hazard, these systems are disadvantageous in that they nonetheless require that the driver ultimately be able to visually locate and identify the object giving rise to the warning. In so doing, the driver is still required to make a decision based on visual information which remains hindered by adverse conditions.
Where these systems have attempted to aid the driver in visually locating the sensed object, such as through a pictorial or graphical display on a screen inside the vehicle, they are disadvantageous in that the driver's attention is diverted from the road ahead to a small display screen inside the vehicle. Valuable reaction time is consumed by the task of translating the orientation of the object shown in the display into the real world environment that the driver sees through the windshield. Furthermore, in instances of a falsely triggered warning, or where the source of the warning no longer presents a potential problem (a deer in the roadway which subsequently retreats into the woods, for example), the driver may be caused to take his/her eyes off the road unnecessarily.
The present invention overcomes these disadvantages and provides a vision enhancement system which aids the driver in visually identifying a sensed object without diverting his/her attention from the road ahead. This is accomplished by providing a means to illuminate the sensed object itself so as to enhance its visibility to the driver and not unduly divert his/her attention from the road. In addition, not only are any difficulties inherent in translating location information from a display screen to the real world eliminated, the total amount of time that the driver has to react to the sensed object is increased.
This is accomplished by operatively coupling one or more sensors used to collect information about the vehicle's environment with a controlled source of illumination. A processor receives input from the sensors and intelligently determines whether a particular object sensed in or near the current path of the vehicle requires alerting the driver. If so, the processor outputs a control signal to effect illumination of the sensed object. The source of illumination is controlled so as to direct light onto the identified object even as the vehicle and/or object move simultaneously with respect to one another.
Other advantages and features of the present invention will become apparent when viewed in light of the description below, taken in conjunction with the attached drawings and appended claims.